The occult was a fixture of Yiddish popular culture in early twentieth-century Eastern Europe. Yiddish-speaking Jews in Eastern Europe held spiritualist séances, consulted with psychic mediums, read their horoscopes in the Yiddish press, consumed Yiddish occult literature, and attended occult stage shows featuring telepathy and hypnosis. In this talk, Samuel Glauber-Zimra will outline the contours of modern occultism in Yiddish popular culture, from its dissemination in the popular press to the occult marketplace that reached Jews across Eastern Europe. Accompanied by rich visual material, he will present the Jewish experience of modernity in Eastern Europe in a new, untold light.
Presented as part of the Yiddish Book Center’s 2023 Decade of Discovery theme, Yiddish Around the World.